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Ervin Santana, Modern-Day Workhorse

Ervin Santana, who held the Cleveland Indians hitless for the Angels’ first solo no-hitter in 27 years on Wednesday, is on first glance an unlikely new member of a small but growing baseball pantheon. He’s good but far from great, yielding a hit per inning in his career. But Santana does possess one trait useful for throwing no-hitters: He’s what passes these days for a workhorse, with a knack for completing games.

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Santana is mobbed for achieving the rare feat of a complete game.

Santana, like many of the other authors of the 256 solo no-hitters in major-league history, is no all-time great. A pitcher with an ERA+ above 100 is better than league average at preventing earned runs. Santana’s career ERA+ is 99. But he is above average in completing games. After getting his no-no, Santana has 11 career complete games and his shutout total remains at six, since he gave up an unearned run in the first inning to the Indians. Those sound like piddling numbers compared to, say, Bob Gibson, who had 28 complete games and 13 shutouts in a single season, in 1968 — and then threw a no-hitter three years later, nearly exactly 40 years ago. But these days, those totals distinguish Santana. He’s 28 years old, and has more shutouts than any other active pitcher younger than 29. He’s also behind only three active pitchers younger than him in complete games.

Santana’s career rates of one no-hitter for every six shutouts and 11 complete games are a sign of the times. This regular season and last, there were a combined eight no-hitters, 112 shutouts and 289 complete games. One out of every 2.6 complete games was a shutout, and one of every 16 shutouts was a no-hitter (not counting Santana’s non-shutout no-hitter). Shutouts are more common than no-hitters, but they’re still quite rare. That’s because managers generally are reluctant to leave starting pitchers in late in games, when they have rested relievers ready to take the mound. (It’s a defensible position, since relief pitchers facing batters for the first time in a game do far better than starters facing batters for the second, third or fourth times.)

It often takes unusual circumstances for the manager not to make the call to the bullpen. Those could be a bullpen tired from an extra-inning night game, or an unusually durable starter breezing through the rotation. But they could also be that the pitcher is working on a rare accomplishment, such as a no-hitter or, these days, a shutout. Among the indications that managers make a special case when a no-hitter is in the offing: The last nine regular-season no-hitters have averaged a pitch count of 120 — including Edwin Jackson’s 149 pitches last year — while the first nine no-hitters since Baseball Reference‘s data included pitch counts in 1988 averaged a count of 111.

This is quite a contrast from baseball as it was played 35 years ago, when pitchers often completed games and compiled shutouts, but pitched no-hitters at a rate similar today. There were just three no-hitters in 1976, but 261 shutouts and 1,039 complete games. One of every four complete games was a shutout and one of each 87 shutouts was a no-hitter.

Many of those CGs and SHOs in 1976 were recorded by Giants starter John Montefusco — also known by his nickname, the same as this WSJ online and print feature: The Count (bafflingly, he’s never appeared in the Daily Fix before now). He had 11 complete games and six shutouts in 1976, precisely the career totals for Ervin Santana, who’s been an Angels starter for seven years. One of Montefusco’s six shutouts in 1976 was a no-hitter, the lone one of his career, which he finished with an ERA+ of 103, similar to Santana’s. The two pitchers are comparable in many ways, except for their very different complete-game and shutout totals — most likely a reflection of their eras rather than their abilities to complete games.

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